currysonic

I think they should have included a hard drive. That way people don't have to risk their money buying hard drives that don't work. In my case all I had to do was buy a Y-Cable. But its incredibly hard to buy a external hard drive thats less than 500GB now adays, which for a non-multimedia device like the Wii U I would say 250 GB is all you would need throughout the product life-cycle.... TOPS.

Great refreshing look on the sales chart though. 

Also, I thought EA wasn't working with Nintendo do bring games on the Wii U??? Does this mean we may see Battlefield 4 on Wii U? =D

Let me take this moment to share my sad story about how I alwase wanted to play battlefield. My earliest experience was with BF: 2142, two of my good friends were playing it and I was over at their house. It looked so fun, with vehicles and teams and stuff! Eventually they got bored of it and let me borrow it... but my pc was crap and it was a slide show even on lowest settings. The next chance was Bad Company. I finally got it for the XBox360, sure it was two years after release but thats ok, well we are moving houses but I'll play it in the new one! Yay! A few hours setting up the living room... wait a minute... the Ethernet cable doesn't reach to where the router is... And now my laptop is too crappy to run battlefield 3, so I'm going to have to skip that. My next great hope is with battlefield 4! I can't afford to get a next gen consol or a new pc/laptop, and nor do I want to get a ps3/360 with wifi since they are late into their life-cycle (some may argue thats better value), so the Wii U is my last bastion of hope.*Sniff*

I don't understand why there are fanboys at all, all games are fun, no matter what system they are on.

Its just kids trying to redefine their consol because their consol defines them. As a child we had a pc that lagged running anything and everything T_T . Consol gaming the only way I got to see anything higher than a power point presentation.

Satoru Iwata lead Nintendo out of the Gamecube era and into the Wii generation. I think he took the stage in 2002 which was about a 6 year low for Nintendo (NTDOY) shares and was the CEO when Nintendo was most successful in 20008. Now Nintendo Shares are at a 6 year low again. I don't have time to look at demand over time for game consols, but the market place change and peoples tastes change. You start a business thinking you will make money, the market changes and suddendly its not as lucrative as you originall thought it would be. Times change, the 3ds and Wii U might be more competitive than the Wii now, but I just don't think people are that into gaming consols these last couple of years and the consol gaming market is contracting (In my opinion).

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I think the last 2 years thepeople simply don't like the DS and Wii as much. Additionally xbox and sony were very good systems at a low price at the time, even now they are still a good value relative to the Wii U. Perhaps instead of asking how much Satoru Iwata lost as CEO during the last 2 years,we should be looking at how well he minimized loss. Sometimes in the short term its impossible not to operate at a loss. I'm being very general throughout all this, I don't have a business background. I'm sure it has much more layers of complexity, as the real world often does.

I feel very well treated as a Nintendo Customer (except Virtual Consol). Nintendo Direct makes me feel a level of connectivity with Nintendo and makes me feel valued as a Nintendo Customer. I hope they continue on strong in the next 6 years.

Once you turn the screen on, it doesn't really show.

What you have there may be Newton Rings. The "gasoline" like mark you see is caused by interference between rays of light reflected by the top and bottom surface of the very thin air gap between the two pieces of glass. In Wii U case its one piece of clear plastic and glass. Although figure 1 shows an ideal situation- it gives you an idea of why Newton Rings form on the Wii U gamepad. Google Newton Rings for more images.



Figure 1. Basically the two bands of light interact with one another to form rings of light and dark areas, or rainbowy colours. This is because the light ray reflected by the flat pane of glass has to travel a further distance (Δy), and is out of phase with the light ray reflected by the curved glass.

Now why would the Wii U's gamepad do this? Well because of the nature of the resistive touch screen. Unlike capacitive touch screens which has two straight glass panels, resistive has one lower glass panel and the upper is a flexible plastic screen (In figure 2 it is Polyester). Like trying to stretch out a really big bed sheet with someone so its perfectly flat, the middle of the bed sheet will alwase be "domed" down due to gravity. My guess is that the Polyester upper screen (Assuming it is polyester, which is a plastic) domes downwards a little (due to gravity? electrostatic force? Not %100 sure.). The upper plasctic surface being curved and the tiny air gap underneith causes this circular interefernce pattern we call Newton Rings.


Figure 2. Wii U vs Ipad (I know the top sais figure 1 lol, just bare with me XD)

I don't know why the game pad has that particular pattern in that location, perhaps its wrinkles in the material or local depressions in that spot or maybe its humidity causing the material to warp (I'm not a materials expert). Most images and figures are highly idealized anyways, which means in nature it doesn't alwase appear as nice concentric circles, like figure 3.


Figure 3, Ta-Da!

Please excuse any bad writing and please feel free to criticise any bad science(science is about disproving a theory until you find one that can't be disproven!). This is just my theory on why there are "gasoline" marks, feel free to interject.

Also hot blowdryer and plastic isnt a really good match... seriously though you can only really see it when the pad isn't displaying anything, no biggy. I've been using mine like like that since launch, it really not noticeable in my opinion. The call is yours to make if you want to take it back, but I personally wouldn't try to fix it by heating or anything, it may warp the plastic top Resistive Screen surface (and void the warrenty).


***Update***
Heres a solution I found on Acer's phone website.

Newton rings on touch screens

Why do I see alternating light and dark rings on my touchscreen?

In some cases, you may see light and dark circles show up on a touchscreen. These circular reflections are called Newton Rings and do not have any effect on the proper functioning of the LCD panel or on the touch functionality.
CAUSE
Due to temperature or pressure differences, the film used for the resistive touch screen may not perfectly adhere to the glass layer of the LCD panel. This can cause reflections showing up as coloured rings.
SOLUTION
These rings go away as the panel warms up during use, and may return again when the system has cooled down. Their occurrence is a known limitation of the used technology and does not indicate a product defect.